


wilderness is paradise enow

by GreyMichaela



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, I really went hard with the nightmare, Joe and the terrible horrible no good very bad day, Love Languages, M/M, Processing trauma and grief, Psychological Trauma, but they don't stay dead, heed the warnings about the graphic violence, sorry in advance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:47:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25917580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreyMichaela/pseuds/GreyMichaela
Summary: It’s raining, he realizes, drops spattering the windows and drumming on the roof. Nicky’s breathing is steady and calm, hands unhesitating as he seeks out the knots in Joe’s muscles and defrays them with perfectly applied pressure, using skill and knowledge gained over hundreds of years of doing this.Nicky has never seen the need to fill silence with words. It was something that took Joe a while to adjust to, Nicky’s way of communicating without speaking. The quirk of his lips, the twitch of an eyebrow, the smallest motion of his head, it’s all said far more for Nicky than words ever could.So it’s something of a surprise when he starts talking.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 77
Kudos: 818





	wilderness is paradise enow

**Author's Note:**

> Personally I blame of-scythia for everything, because we started discussing Joe's and Nicky's love languages and then I spiraled. So really, it's all her fault this happened, go yell at her.
> 
> This is the result of us agreeing that Joe's had the Worst Day Ever and needs time to process everything and work through Some Shit™. Nicky's love language is acts of service (protecting Joe by sleeping in front, etc). Joe's is words (the iconic speech in the van). I figure when you're 900+ years old, you've learned to speak each other's languages in more ways than one, plus it's canon Nicky likes to read. Hence, Nicky communicating to Joe in _Joe's_ most intimate language how much he loves him.

It’s a long time before they’re truly alone. They’d gone to Copley’s house after getting out of Merrick’s gleaming glass and steel prison, figuring they’d regroup and decide where to go from there. In his master bathroom, Joe and Nicky had taken one look at the huge shower, shared a glance, and stripped silently. 

The water is so hot it almost scalds them, turning Nicky’s skin rosy as he stands directly under the spray, face lifted to the water. Joe takes his shoulder after a minute and turns him, urging his head back. Nicky closes his eyes and lets Joe wash the blood and bits of bone out of his hair. Joe keeps his eyes on his task and very carefully doesn’t look at the swirls of pink that circle the drain. If he doesn’t think about it, he can handle it. If he doesn’t think about Keane grabbing Nicky’s hair, shoving his gun into Nicky’s mouth—

His fingers catch on a tangle. Nicky makes a noise and Joe flinches.

“Sorry,” he says, turning to grope for the shampoo so he doesn’t have to meet Nicky’s eyes. But when he turns back, Nicky catches his wrist, circling it with his long, lovely fingers. His gaze is clear and direct, still his beloved Nicky, so steady and sure of himself, eyes searching Joe’s, and Joe can’t help the broken sound that escapes as he crowds close until they’re pressed together from head to toe and he can tuck his face into Nicky’s throat.

Nicky holds him, as unwavering as ever, as the water beats down on them and Joe fights the tremors still running through him. Nicky’s running a hand up and down Joe’s back in slow, soothing sweeps, like Joe’s a horse that needs to be calmed. Slowly, the trembling eases, and Nicky leans back enough to tip Joe’s head up.

He doesn’t kiss him right away. Instead he just looks at him from a few inches away, searching his face with that peculiar intensity of his as if he’s memorizing Joe’s features all over again. Joe lets him look, knowing this is what Nicky needs—the reassurance that Joe is still  _ Joe. _ They’re tested by the fire, reformed into something slightly different every time they heal, but still they come out of the crucible unmistakably, inarguably, them.

Nicky’s lips are soft when he takes Joe’s mouth, tipping his head for the perfect angle. They’ve always fit together just right, breath mingling as Nicky dips between Joe’s lips, tongue sweet and soft. Joe closes his eyes and lets Nicky take over, directing the kiss, delving inside Joe’s mouth in ever deepening touches, until Joe has surrendered completely, clinging to Nicky’s shoulders just to keep himself upright.

Someone bangs on the door and Joe startles. Nicky growls, pulling him back in for another kiss as Andy bangs again.

“Not the time!” she yells.

Nicky sighs against Joe’s mouth and releases him. “Later,” he murmurs, pressing their foreheads together briefly, and reaches for the shampoo.

Once they’ve regrouped, they have to decide what to do with Booker. It takes a long time, a lot of arguing and bargaining, but they finally reach a consensus everyone can accept.

Joe stands beside Nicky, Nile on the step below them, as Andy goes to tell Booker their verdict. He watches the way Booker’s shoulders slump, just barely, before he nods. Joe glances at Nicky and finds him looking at him. They gaze at each other silently for a minute as Andy hugs Booker and then heads for them. As the others turn to go up the stairs, Joe holds Booker’s eyes for a minute. Booker meets his gaze steadily, and Joe thinks of all the things he wants to say.

Finally, Booker nods almost imperceptibly, and Joe turns to follow the others.

That night, no one’s willing to be too far from Andy. Someone’s flanking her at all times as they pick a cheap motel and book adjoining rooms, and it’s clear she’s already losing patience with it, judging from the way her lips are pressed together. But she says nothing as they find their rooms and toss their bags at the foot of the beds. 

They eat takeaway on the beds in Andy’s room with their legs folded under them. Nile is starting to look a little more comfortable, although there’s a sadness in her eyes now, as if she’s seen too much. It hurts Joe to see it, but he just eats lo mein and wishes he was alone with Nicky, who’s beside him, close enough their knees are touching. Booker’s absence in the room feels like an open wound, raw and aching. Joe presses his knee to Nicky’s and Nicky pushes back against it silently.

“We’re going back to Copley’s in the morning,” Andy says when she’s finished, and Joe stiffens.

“Boss—”

Nicky puts a hand on Joe’s knee and he stops, swallowing the rest of the sentence.

Andy doesn’t look at him as she stands and disposes of her trash. “Get some sleep,” she says over her shoulder. “Nile’s with me.”

Joe casts her a helpless look but follows Nicky to the door.

In their room, Nicky lets Joe step inside first, closing the door and throwing the deadbolts before turning. Joe finds himself in the middle of the dingy room, hands hanging uselessly at his sides. He feels… unmoored, adrift in uncertainty, like a step in any direction will be the wrong one.

Nicky takes his shoes off without saying anything, then takes Joe by the arm and guides him to the bed. Joe sits obediently and Nicky kneels in front of him. He takes Joe’s shoes off and then leans forward and drops a soft kiss on Joe’s inner thigh. Then he wraps his arms around Joe’s waist and Joe opens his legs so Nicky can shuffle closer, until his cheek is pressed to Joe’s abdomen. Joe strokes the hair off his forehead as Nicky holds on, eyes closed.

“How are you, love?” Joe finally asks, feeling suddenly guilty. 

Nicky moves a shoulder and says nothing. Joe resumes stroking his hair, letting the contact ground him. They’re here, they’re together. Everything else is just details that can be worked out later.

It’s a long time before either of them stirs, but finally they get up and move the bed into the corner away from the windows. Then Joe crawls under the covers and Nicky follows him, slipping his gun under the pillow as Joe wraps himself up against his back, arm draped over Nicky’s so their fingers are touching.

Nicky turns his wrist and laces their fingers together and they fall asleep like that, exhaustion pulling them under in record time.

Dust is in Joe’s eyes, clogging his nose and mouth, filling the room until everything is hazy and out of focus. He tastes clay on his tongue, mixed with the acrid copper tang of blood.

He rolls to his knees, blinking frantically to clear his vision as he sweeps the room. Nicky is flat on his back, eyes open and unseeing. Black blood, thick and clinging, halos his head in a slowly-widening pool.

Joe swallows nausea and scrambles to him.  _ Okay, it takes a minute sometimes, just give it time. _ Blood soaks into the knees of his pants as he tries to make himself touch Nicky’s face. He can’t do it, can’t bear to look at the shattered ruin of his mouth. Tears sting his eyes and he turns his head away, sucking in air.

“Nicky,” he says, bending over him. “Come on. Wake up, you’re not done yet. Nicolò!”

Nothing. 

“ Nicolò,” Joe says again, and now he’s pleading, prostrated and begging. “Please, love,  _ please. _ Don’t leave me yet.  _ Wake up.” _ He grabs him, clutching Nicky’s bloodstained shirt, pushing at his shoulder, pounding on his chest. He can’t see for the tears blinding him, a sob caught in his throat. If he lets it out, if he lets his control slip for even an instant, he’ll start screaming and never stop.

Nicky’s head lolls lifelessly as Joe shakes him.

There’s blood on Joe’s hands, Nicky’s lifeblood streaking his palms, an almost mockingly vibrant crimson against his skin.

He’s gone.

He’s left Joe, left him alone in this bastard of a world, left him to figure out how to live when half his body, half his heart and soul, have been ripped away from him without anesthesia.

Joe folds forward, the air stolen from his lungs. He would scream but it hurts too much to even draw breath.

Rough hands grab him, wrenching him backward, and Joe lashes out, twisting and fighting, and  _ now _ he’s screaming as he struggles to get back to Nicky’s still body.

_ “Yusuf, stop, it’s me!” _ Nicky’s voice,  _ Nicky  _ speaking Arabic with both arms around Joe as he thrashes. “Yusuf, my love, my heart, wake up,  _ please.” _

Awareness snaps into focus and Joe stops fighting instantly. His heart is hammering in his chest, Nicky’s breathing harsh in his ear but almost drowned by the roaring in his head. 

“ Nicolò,” he manages, turning blindly toward him, and Nicky helps him roll so they’re pressed together chest-to-chest, slinging his leg over Joe’s hips to pull him in even closer.

Joe clings to him, burying his face in Nicky’s throat. He can feel Nicky’s pulse racing, and guilt surges through him. He wants to apologize,  _ needs _ to apologize even though he knows Nicky isn’t upset with him, but he can’t make words form past the boulder lodged in his throat. 

Nicky’s arms are solid and strong, a cage keeping Joe safe. He’s humming quietly, so low Joe has to strain to hear him. It’s an Arabic lullaby Joe’s sung to him before, on nights when Nicky couldn’t sleep, and tears sting Joe’s eyes.

He manages a shaky breath and Nicky tightens his grip.

Someone pounds on the door.

“We’re fine, Andy,” Nicky calls.

“Let me in or I’m breaking down the door,” Andy demands, voice muffled.

“Break it down then,” Nicky says flatly.

The door ricochets inward a heartbeat later, bouncing off the far wall. Joe doesn’t look up, but he can imagine the way she stalks inside, ready to kill whoever caused Joe to make that noise.

There’s a brief pause. 

“Move,” Andy orders, and she must be standing directly above them.

Nicky shifts them both a few inches toward the edge of the bed, away from the wall, and that’s enough for Andy, who immediately clambers over both of them, sharp knee poking Joe in the kidney before she settles in, pressed up against Joe’s back, with a small, satisfied noise.

She slings an arm over his ribs, breath warm on the nape of his neck, and  _ now _ Joe really is crying. He’s going to lose Nicky, unless he’s somehow lucky enough to die first. He’s going to lose  _ Andy, _ his dearest friend, his older sister, sooner rather than later.  _ And _ he’s lost Booker for the next hundred years.

It’s a truth he lives with—that they  _ all _ live with—every day, but most of the time he can pretend it isn’t there. He can tell himself this is how it will be forever, Nicky by his side, Andy at his back, Booker complaining about everything and drinking too much. 

But he can’t hide from it any longer. It’s staring him in the face, a millennia with his family only for them to all be torn from him.

His shoulders shake with the sob he can’t quite suppress. He’s not  _ ready. _

“You know,” Andy remarks, sounding entirely composed, “I really do love you, Joe, but you are the most  _ dramatic _ motherfucker I’ve ever met, and I once spent two weeks partying with Oscar Wilde.”

Joe hiccups in shock and Nicky shakes with silent laughter, rubbing Joe’s back as if in apology. 

“You—that’s not—I don’t—” Joe trails off and Andy snickers.

“Shut the fuck up and go to sleep,” she suggests, and Joe obeys, feeling oddly comforted.

When he wakes up, in the cool grey light of dawn, he and Nicky are alone.

They’ve migrated into their usual sleeping pattern in the night, Nicky with his back to Joe’s front and Joe’s back to the wall. 

Since the first time they shared a bed roll, that’s how it’s been. Nicky likes Joe where he knows he’s safe, where anyone coming for Joe has to go through him. Joe usually likes it that way so he can protect Nicky’s vulnerable back, but right now he wants to see his beloved’s face. 

He pokes him in the ribs. Nicky twitches in his sleep, making a complaining noise. Joe does it again and Nicky grumbles, pushing Joe’s hand away.

“ Nicolò,” Joe whispers, and watches the awareness ripple through Nicky’s body as he wakes up.

He stretches, yawning, and then rolls over so they’re nose-to-nose. His eyes are sleepy but his lips curve when he sees Joe looking at him. 

“Did Andy really break down the door?” Joe asks, and Nicky’s smile widens.

“Just the latch. I fixed it after she left, once you were asleep.”

Joe yawns, rubbing his eyes. When he lowers his hand, Nicky’s watching him closely.

“Tell me how you’re feeling,” he says.

Joe balks briefly. “Can we just go have breakfast with the others and  _ pretend _ we talked about our feelings instead?”

Nicky arches an eyebrow, implacable as ever, and Joe folds with a sigh. 

He pushes a little closer so he doesn’t have to see his face, burrowing into Nicky’s chest. Nicky wraps his free arm around him and waits.

Joe takes a breath against Nicky’s T-shirt. “Yesterday—it fucked me up.” The words come out raw and a little wobbly.

Nicky tightens his grip.

“Booker… and Andy… a-and watching that  _ fucking _ doctor cut pieces off you while I couldn’t  _ do _ anything about it—” Joe drags in air as Nicky waits, letting him get it out. “But Keane though….”

His throat threatens to close at the memory again. Nicky rubs his back.

“We’d just found out Andy was mortal, and then he—” Joe gulps. “I thought you wouldn’t wake up, Nicolò, I thought you’d l-left me.” Tears are stinging his eyes again and Nicky cups his face in both warm palms.

“I am here,” he says in Italian. “Right here, with you. Always,  _ habibi. _ I will always come back to you. I always have, haven’t I?”

Joe closes his eyes briefly and nods.

“What do you need?” Nicky asks him.

Joe opens his eyes with a sigh. “I don’t—I don’t know. You. I need you. I just—”

Nicky nods. “You need to remember the good.” He’s got that  _ look _ on his face, the expression that says he’s planning something. “Sit up, then.”

Joe obeys and Nicky helps him pull off his T-shirt, stealing kisses between peeling it up and over Joe’s head. He drops it on the floor and presses more kisses down Joe’s throat and chest, his lips warm. Joe lets his head fall back, eyes sliding shut. 

It’s so rare they’re able to do this. More often it’s rushed handjobs in the dark, palms over each other’s mouths to keep the noise contained as Booker and Andy sleep a few feet away, or a few stolen moments when they  _ should _ be sleeping but instead slipped away while someone else is on watch. Having all of Nicky’s considerable focus and attention on him and him alone, with time to actually enjoy it is… heady. 

Nicky’s clever fingers are working on Joe’s pants, and Joe obligingly lifts his hips so he can work them down his thighs.

“You—” he starts, but Nicky’s already busy sucking a mark over Joe’s hipbone, hand flat on Joe’s stomach as he worries the patch of skin with his teeth, and Joe forgets what he’d been about to say. He makes a noise as he goes from half-hard to fully in a dizzying instant, hips jerking helplessly. 

Nicky presses him down again, never letting up. He scrapes across the sensitive area with his teeth and Joe shoves the back of his hand against his own mouth to stifle the noise. Alone or not, they don’t need the hotel staff coming to investigate the disturbance.

Finally, Nicky lifts his head to survey his work, looking distinctly satisfied. He smoothes a thumb over the mark that’s already fading, murmuring endearments under his breath in Italian.

“I wish I could wear your marks always,” Joe whispers, and Nicky’s lips curve.

“I would never let you out of bed.” 

“I’m failing to see a downside,” Joe points out, and Nicky laughs softly.

He rolls off the bed and strips, quick and efficient as ever while Joe watches. 

“What do you have in mind?” Joe asks as Nicky slides back onto the mattress.

“If you are very, very good, maybe you’ll find out,” Nicky says, and his voice is low and dark, making Joe shiver all over. Nicky pushes him flat and urges him onto his stomach. Joe goes easily, pillowing his head on his arms. 

Nicky straddles him, his weight solid and comforting. His hands are warm as he spreads them on Joe’s back, tracing the moles and freckles he’s memorized so many times before. When he digs a thumb into his trapezius, Joe grunts and relaxes even more.

It’s raining, he realizes, drops spattering the windows and drumming on the roof. Nicky’s breathing is steady and calm, hands unhesitating as he seeks out the knots in Joe’s muscles and defrays them with perfectly applied pressure, skill and knowledge gained over hundreds of years of doing this.

Nicky has never seen the need to fill silence with words. It was something that took Joe a while to adjust to, Nicky’s way of communicating without speaking. The quirk of his lips, the twitch of an eyebrow, the smallest motion of his head, it’s all said far more for Nicky than words ever could.

So it’s something of a surprise when he starts talking.

_ “Hear me when I say our love’s not meant to be an opiate; helpmate, _

_ “You are the reachable mirror that dares me to risk the caravan back _

_ “To the apogee, the longed-for arms of the Beloved—” _

Joe twists his head just enough to see him, and Nicky meets his eyes steadily.

“I love that poem,” Joe whispers.

“I know,  _ habibi,” _ Nicky says quietly. His thumbs are ruthless when he digs in, and Joe can’t stop another grunt. Nicky doesn’t ease the pressure, but he makes a humming noise and Joe forces himself to relax again.

Nicky bends and kisses Joe’s spine.

_ “My body writes into your flesh, the poem you make of me,” _ he murmurs.  _ “Carry me when you go forth over land or sea.” _

Joe closes his eyes. Nicky’s voice is calm and unhurried as he recites line after line of Joe’s favorite poems, a fragment from the Rubaiyat and then a snippet of Yeats, the poem he likes to quote simply to make Joe laugh, weaving a tapestry of love and devotion that he kneads into Joe’s skin until Joe is warmed from the inside out.

_ “It feels right to be up this close in tight wind,”  _ Nicky is saying.  _ “It feels right to notice all the shiny things about you.”  _ He shifts his weight and starts on a new set of muscles.  _ “About you there is nothing I wouldn’t want to know. With you nothing is simple yet nothing is simpler.” _

Joe loves this man  _ so much. _ The thought, not new in itself, still slams into him with the force of a freight train. Nicky,  _ his Nicky, _ his beautiful beloved who’d rather let his deeds speak for him than have to express himself with words, is speaking to Joe in  _ his _ language, giving him love the way it nourishes Joe’s soul the most.

He twists, suddenly frantic with the need to touch, to hold him, and Nicky goes up on his knees so Joe can flip over. As soon as he’s on his back, he’s reaching up, dragging Nicky down until their mouths meet. He’s desperate with it, to crawl inside Nicky’s skin and be  _ one _ with him, to feel what he feels and think his thoughts. He wraps his arms around Nicky’s neck, tongues hot and messy and perfect against each other. Nicky has his elbows on either side of Joe’s head, pressing him into the mattress until all Joe can feel is Nicky, his world  _ is _ Nicky, over and above him.

They kiss for what feels like an eternity, arousal simmering warm under Joe’s skin but not a pressing thing to be attended to yet. It’s more important to feel the way Nicky sucks on Joe’s tongue, his lower lip, dipping inside his mouth with teasing sweeps of his own tongue. His breath is warm and sweet, and it’s all Joe needs. He could go several more millennia with just Nicky’s kisses to sustain him, he thinks, dizzy with it.

Nicky doesn’t ease off until Joe’s lips are swollen and tingling. His eyes are dark as he searches Joe’s face, and Joe is suddenly shaking with need.

“Please,” he manages. “ Nicolò, please, if you don’t fuck me  _ right now _ I really may die.”

Nicky snorts a laugh. “Always so elegant,” he teases, dropping a quick kiss on Joe’s nose. 

“There’s a time and place for elegant,” Joe says. He reaches between them to clasp Nicky’s cock for the way Nicky shudders, breath catching. “And right now isn’t it, unless we’re talking about your  _ elegant _ cock—” He squeezes and Nicky groans. “Inside me.”

“Lie back,” Nicky rasps, and Joe obeys instantly, collapsing backward onto the bed as Nicky leans over to rummage in the go-bag stashed beside them on the floor.

He loves this part. No matter how much Joe urges him to speed up, to get him prepped—because that’s  _ Nicky’s _ job, not Joe’s, and he takes it very seriously—Nicky refuses to hurry. First one long, slim finger tracing a reverent circle around his rim and then pressing deep, oh-so-slowly, pulling out and then pushing back in, a slow, wet drag that has Joe panting and begging before Nicky’s even added a second finger.

This time is no different. Joe lets his legs splay as Nicky kneels between them, eyes sharp and focused. There’s no rushing him, Joe knows, and  _ that _ sends a delicious thrill up his spine.

He plants a foot on the bed to give Nicky better access and Nicky hums, pleased, adding another finger. Joe’s back arches and he swears, slapping a palm against the wall to steady himself, but Nicky’s rhythm never falters.

Joe is leaking onto his own belly, smearing a glistening trail through the tight-curled hair, and Nicky bends, holding his eyes, and sucks the tip of Joe’s cock into his mouth.

He sucks once, hard, and then lifts his head even as Joe jerks, helplessly trying to follow. Nicky smiles and drives his fingers deep, twisting his wrist.

“I could make you come like this,” he says. He sounds calm, conversational, and Joe gulps.

“Please _ , hayati _ , I don’t—”

“You don’t want to come?”

Joe narrows his eyes and Nicky grins, pleased with himself. He adds a third finger and Joe comes up off the bed with a bitten-off shout.

Nicky  _ can _ make him come like this, is the best and the worst part. Joe’s always been at the mercy of Nicky’s clever hands, always helplessly unspooling beneath them until he’s nothing but a pile of spare parts, mindless and begging as Nicky works him over, slow and ruthless.

“I w-want you inside me when—” He forgets the rest of his sentence when Nicky finds the knot of nerves at his center and  _ presses. _

“You can come twice,” Nicky says, voice entirely steady, and there are tears leaking from Joe’s eyes as he shakes his head frantically. Nicky’s hand is still moving, eyes sharp as a hawk on Joe’s face, and Joe sobs, curling his hands into fists until his nails are digging into skin, using the sharp pain to fight back the orgasm.

Nicky keeps pressing in at first, but then he seems to take pity and pulls his fingers out, until finally Joe feels steady enough to meet his eyes.

He doesn’t say anything. For once in his life he can’t think of anything  _ to _ say, him, Yusuf al Kaysani, the merchant’s son with the silver tongue, able to charm the moon from the sky, his mother used to say, shaking her head with an indulgent smile.

He  _ has _ charmed the moon from the sky, he thinks wildly, conjured him into human form by the sheer force of his longing, and now he’s looking at Joe as if  _ he’s _ somehow the lucky one, wonder in his brilliant green eyes.

Joe swallows, and something almost like pain contorts Nicky’s face. He lunges forward and Joe curls up to meet him, their mouths meeting in hungry desperation.

“Please,” Joe manages, wrapping his arms around Nicky’s neck. Nicky kisses like he’s drowning, stealing Joe’s breath until his head is spinning, and it feels like a deliciously agonizing eon passes before he finally lowers Joe back to the bed, not breaking the kiss even as he gets himself into position.

He doesn’t need to see, not after all this time. He knows Joe’s body inside and out, a well-worn road he’s traveled so many times he can do it blindfolded and never miss a step. 

The first thrust drives the air from Joe’s lungs. Nicky’s groan sounds like it’s ripped from him, tremors wracking his lean frame, and he presses his forehead to Joe’s to breathe for a minute.

“You feel so  _ good,” _ he whispers, and he sounds awed, as if he hasn’t been inside Joe as many times as Joe’s been in him. He’s all Joe can process, around and over and inside him, and when he moves, it makes a broken noise of gratitude fall from Joe’s throat.

“Shh,” Nicky croons, and kisses him, hips working slow and relentless. “I have you, my heart.”

Joe lets go, surrendering himself to the sensations. Nicky is a heavy living blanket, breath warm on Joe’s cheek, stomach grazing Joe’s cock every few thrusts and sending sparks dancing through him.

“Do you see?” Nicky gasps after a few minutes. His rhythm is still steady but his voice is ragged, fraying around the edges. “Do you—”

Joe’s own voice is long gone. He can’t find words, can’t do anything but sob for air and clutch at Nicky’s shoulders. Warmth is building at his center, burgeoning outward, urged on by the dragging slide and thrust of Nicky’s cock, spearing him open and laying him bare.

Nicky shifts, tilting Joe’s hips and changing his angle, and Joe’s orgasm rolls over him in a crashing wave, inexorable as the tide. Nicky swears thickly and gets a hand on him as Joe clenches tight around him and spills all over his stomach, shuddering helplessly as Nicky works him through it.

Nicky’s thrusts speed up, eyes going distant. Joe loves this part the most, the way every nerve in his body is shivery hot and overstimulated as Nicky stops thinking about Joe’s pleasure and chases his own. He wraps a heel around Nicky’s hips and urges him on, harder, faster, until Nicky is shaking, finally,  _ finally _ losing his rhythm. He plunges deep and freezes, braced on his elbows. His head falls forward, breath harsh against Joe’s collarbone, minute shivers running through his frame. His hair is soft where it brushes Joe’s cheek, and Joe turns to press a kiss to the crown of Nicky’s head.

It’s several long, luxurious minutes before either of them stir, but finally Nicky groans and slides free, making Joe wince.

“Come back,” he complains when Nicky sits up on his heels. His limbs are warm and heavy, spine like melted butter. He paws at Nicky’s leg, trying and failing to pull him back on top of him, and Nicky laughs, catching his hand.

“Tell me how you feel,  _ habibi.” _

“Sticky,” Joe says truthfully, and tugs on Nicky’s hand when he moves as if to get off the bed. “We can shower in a minute, would you just—”

This time Nicky goes, slotting himself up against Joe’s side and draping a leg over his thighs. He’s warm and solid and perfect, and Joe takes a minute to actually think about what he’d asked.

It’s like Nicky’s wiped him clean, he realizes, taken everything he’s suffered—everything  _ they’ve _ suffered—and rewritten it. It’s not gone—it will never be gone, Joe’s not so naive that he’d think or even hope for that—but the fangs of it have been pulled. He can think of it without the pain slicing through him, like it’s held behind glass where it can never touch him again.

“I’m alright,” he says, and he’s surprised to realize he’s telling the truth. “Or I will be.”

Nicky hums inquisitively and Joe kisses his crown again.

“Truly. You reminded me… why we’re still here. What’s important.”

“I did?” Nicky sounds amused. “Maybe I just wanted to make you feel good.”

“Well, you certainly did that too.” Joe tips Nicky’s chin up and steals a kiss, laughing against his mouth. “Thank you,” he whispers.

“What is the difference between you and the sky?” Nicky murmurs, and Joe laughs again, heart lighter than it’s been in a while.

“Exactly,” he says. “We should probably shower and meet Andy and Nile before Andy breaks the door down again.”

They eat croissants in the cafe down the street with Andy and Nile, the rain coming down in sheets now. Joe tells Nile a story about Andy seducing Cleopatra as Andy laughs and protests and tells Nile he’s making the whole thing up. Nile’s eyes are huge, switching between Andy and Joe and occasionally flickering to Nicky, who’s staying out of it with a smile that says he knows better than to get involved.

It’s cold and gloomy outside, but the little restaurant is brightly decorated and warm, and Nicky’s hand finds Joe's under the table as Andy interrupts his story to tell Nile about the time Joe tried to convince Booker he’d known the Prophet Muhammad. 

“He believed me for at  _ least _ ten years,” Joe says, grinning, and squeezes Nicky’s hand as Nicky smiles back at him.

**Author's Note:**

> The poems cited are, in order:
> 
> [Beautiful Signor](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/52206/beautiful-signor), by Cyrus Cassells
> 
> [Whoever You Are Holding Me Now in Hand](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/49204/whoever-you-are-holding-me-now-in-hand), by Walt Whitman
> 
> [The Rubaiyat (also the title)](https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/475599-here-with-a-loaf-of-bread-beneath-the-bough-a), Omar Khayyam
> 
> [When You Are Old](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43283/when-you-are-old), by WB Yeats (Nicky uses this one to make Joe laugh)
> 
> [Lines Depicting Simple Happiness](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/51788/lines-depicting-simple-happiness) by Peter Gizzi
> 
> [My Lover Asks Me](https://mypoeticside.com/show-classic-poem-22948), by Nizār Qabbānī. 
> 
> Thank you for reading, and you can find me on [Tumblr](http://greymichaela.tumblr.com), although I apologize in advance for the playoff hockey screaming. It's a very weird time and I have a lot of emotions.


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